Historical and Rhetorical Context Rough Draft- WSP

Dylan Deines

4/6/16

Historical Context

Dr. Brown

Women Strike for Peace

Historical Context

            In 1961, 16 years after the bombing of Japan by atomic bombs (Shaller), nearly 50,000 women left their jobs and homes in one of the biggest peace movements that the United States had ever seen up until that point.  The Cold War was at one of its most critical states in history, as the Soviet Union had just tested a few of its new atomic bombs—the residue from them slowly making its way over United States cities (Swerdlow). In response, as was the Cold War fashion at the time, the United States threatened to do the same and test their own weapons of mass destruction. Although it would only be a “test” that they wanted to perform, many feared that the residue from the bomb would create health risks for people all over the world. The 50,000 women, mostly mothers, feared for their children’s safety (Swerdlow).

            In a society where men were favored as the dominant beings, where men were expected to make the decisions and wives were expected to stay home, the movement for peace performed by these women was something no one thought possible; yet what was thought impossible happened, begging the question how? What motivations did these mothers have to drop their work and their domesticity to march for peace?

            Women in the 1960’s had gone through some rough times: from the Great Depression in 1929, all the way to the end of World War II, and then the Cold War following right afterwards (Shaller). The women of this generation were strong because of their fearlessness during these times. Nearly 500,000 American men died during World War II (By the Numbers- World Wide Deaths), forcing women to step up and fill the void left by the deaths of American soldiers. At the beginning of the war there were 12 million women working for wages, by the end of the war, nearly 17 million were employed (Shaller). 80 percent of the public voted against women working, but by 1942 (a year after the war started) that figure was flipped and 80 percent of the public believed it was acceptable for women to work, “Wartime labor shortages changed public policy and attitudes toward women in the work force, especially in jobs traditionally held by men in shipyards, on assembly lines, and in aircraft factories,” (Shaller 848). Propaganda at the time called women in to action, “encourage[ing] women to join the industrial work force,” (Shaller 848).

            By 1945, however, the return of men from the war led to the decrease of women in the workforce and the numbers returned to where they were before the war began (Shaller). The women of the generation, however, felt their own sense of victory. They played a huge key part in the victory of the war. Most woman may not have been on the front lines, but nonetheless the women of World War II fought their own kind of battle, and in the end they came out on top and wanting more (Swerdlow).

            Dagmar Wilson, a children’s book illustrator, gave the women of the war the opportunity to fight another battle. Wilson was angered by recent world events, “not only by the resumption of nuclear testing after a three year hiatus but also by the Berlin Wall crisis, which, she feared, could escalate into a push-button nuclear holocaust,” (Swerdlow 17). A comment by her husband, Christopher Wilson, influenced her to do something about it, “once women become determined they usually get what their way.” It was only a few days later when a group of 6 women, including Dagmar Wilson, got together and began to figure out what could be done to save the health and livelihood of their children. Wilson described the encounter as such: “It was a warm September night in 1961. Six Women sat in a Georgetown living room. We were worried. We were indignant. We were angry. The Soviet Union and the U.S.A. were accusing each other of having broken a moratorium on nuclear testing. What matter who broke it when everyone’s children would fall victim to radioactive Strontium 90?... Perhaps, we told ourselves that night, in the face of male ‘logic,’ which seemed to us utterly illogical, it was time for women to speak out,” (Swerdlow 17).

            The women used their contacts in order for the movement to gain steam, calling old friends that they found in their phone book and telling those friends to tell others. In only five weeks the women were able to gain thousands of supporters for the movement, organizing 68 local actions and creating the motto “Appeal to all governments to end the arms race—not the human race,” (Swerdlow 18). The women also sent letters to higher and famous officials, such as Jacqueline Kennedy and Nina Khrushchev, in hopes of getting even more people to join the motion for peace, but they were mostly ignored. Despite the fact that they didn’t have a famous face to ignite the movement, it took off regardless.

            The women who joined the movement “were college-educated women who had participated in the work force in the war years, many finding more interesting and satisfying employment than their older sisters and mothers had, because of the shortage of men. At the war’s end most of the future WSP women left the work force, sometimes reluctantly, to contribute to the baby boom and to practice full-time live-in motherhood while populating the suburbs, along with millions of their white, middle-class cohorts,” (Swerdlow 2).

            2 months later, from the original meeting of 6 women in September of 1961, 50,000 women in 60 different communities banded together in one single outburst, a group made solely of women, driven by women, and influenced by women, to make their voices known to the world about their disgust with the governments of both the Soviet Union and the United States of America. In only 2-years’ time after the formation of Women Strike for Peace and their one-day protest, John F. Kennedy signed the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty on August 5, 1963 with the Soviet Union (Nuclear Test Ban Treaty).

Rhetorical Context

            So what made the WSP so successful? Other organizations that had originated before the WSP took years to see their full potential, yet the women of WSP were able to do it in just a couple of months, and without the help of men or famous affiliations. The founder was just an ordinary, middle class mother who found that the state of her current surrounding were far less than ideal, and yet she was able to create one of the biggest women-based (non-feminist) movements in United States history. To answer that question, their “identity” as mothers be an important part of the study.

            When the men came back from World War II the idea of “motherhood” and the importance of nurturing, loving, and domesticity took on a whole new form of importance to society. With nearly half a million soldier lost a significant void in the population was ever present, thus the baby boom became the answer to this problem. Women, more than ever, expected to have multiple children and stay home to nurture them while their husbands worked. Mothers became more important than ever in their efforts to return the country back to normalcy, and it is this important role that in the end gave the women of the WSP more power than they had ever had before, “[Angnes] Meyer urged fifties women to ‘boldly announce that no job is more exacting, more necessary, or more rewarding that that of housewife and mother,’” (Swerdlow 2).

            Thus their identity as mothers in the formation of the WSP was more influential than their identities as simple women. The idea that mothers were protesting for change sparked interest and allowed the women of the organization appeal to society in an effective and clear way. Amy Swerdlow writes, “What attractred the media was the notion that the ‘lady next door,’ who had been living in her kitchen in domestic bliss for over a decade, was moving into public spaces and occupying them with militancy and determination. Instead of listening demurely, she was lecturing and demanding, and she could not be ignored or attacked because she was doing it all in the name of a hallowed institution—motherhood,” (Swerdlow 21).

            Understanding the effect of identifying as mothers, the WSPers focused their rhetoric strategies towards that one identity, “I don’t belong to any organization,” explained a woman being interviewed by Sophia Wyatt of the Manchester Guardian, “I’ve got a child of ten,” (Swerdlow 16). Mass media coverage of the movement greatly increased the favorability of the women, and helped to create the “motherhood” identity even stronger. In fact, the media made every opportunity they could to describe the women of the WSP as “mothers,” “The press chose to identify Wilson primarily as a mother, despite the fact that she made it clear in the first strike press release that she was a ‘well-known children’s book illustrator.’ The Baltimore Sun describes Wilson as a ‘small elfin woman who has three daughters and whose usual spare-time occupation is illustrating children’s books,’” (Swerdlow 22). With the media attention they needed, the women of the WSP were on the correct path of success.

Unlike other successful protests in the past, the WSP had a goal that was not directly tied to themselves, but instead was directed to the protection of innocent children. The movement was easily relatable to everyone across the country and spoke to individuals on a very personal level. This rhetorical goal put other people who disagreed with what the women were doing in a tough situation; the WSP had the power, now all they had to do was harness it.

            That is not to assume that there weren’t people against what the women of the WSP were doing; with any movement there is always some kind of retaliation to it otherwise it wouldn’t be a protest. The Cold War made America more prideful of its nation more than ever—mostly because the idea of not being “prideful” led people to believe one was either a socialist or a communist. The idea of women in America speaking out against Cold War politics scared many people, including Chief William H. Parker of the Los Angeles Police Department, “There undoubtedly were many fine people duped into thinking they were doing something constructive, but this type of revolution against constituted authority serve[s] the Soviet well. I’m sure this ‘demonstration for peace’ has been well noted in the Kremlin and that they are happy about the whole movement,” (Swerdlow 24). Other officials, such as Mayor Sam Yorty of Los Angeles also disagreed with what the movement meant in regards to a political stand-point, “I urge that you restate your allegiance wo your country and acknowledge that government must be supported in whatever it must do to deal with international events,” (Swerdlow 24). Other painted the organization as just a “mob of women,” who did not fully grasp the dangers of protest against the government during the Cold War (Swerdlow 24). Even more surprising was the outcry against the movement by other women, specifically those themselves in politics. Wilson wrote to Eleanor Roosevelt in hopes she would be a part of the movement, she wrote “Your presence and voice would give incalculable inspiration to women strange to the ways of political activity, but brought together to ask the leaders of the world and the lawmakers of our nation for a peaceful and uncontaminated present and future for us all,” to which Roosevelt responded, “I am sorry to say that I cannot be with you on October 25^th, and I do not plan to do anything to help unless you have consulted the President and the Secretary of State and have their consent.” She would later say in one of her columns, “I do not approve of this kind of action. It seems meaningless to me,” (Swerdlow 20-21). Abandoned by state officials and the first women, the “housewives” of the WSP literally did all the work themselves.

            Despite the negative talk of the movement, the women of the WSP kept true to what they were trying to accomplish. The organization’s motto, “End the Arms Race—Not the Human Race,” outlined the WSP goals, but they specifically had six demands that they wished to be inacted, “(1) a ban on all atomic weapons testing; (2) negotations to put all atomic weapons under international control; (3) concrete steps to be taken at once toward worldwide disarmament; (4) immediate allocation of as much of the national budget to preparation for peace as was being spent in preparation for war; (5) an immediate moratorium on name-calling on both sides; (6) the strengthening of the United nations,” (Swerdlow 20).  Their rhetorical goal, however, was to appeal to the women and the men of the country, who have mothers who worry about their safety or are themselves mothers and fathers worried about their children’s safety.